Questionnair

Questionnaire (by watching <flat story>)

1>  Do you think there is a difference between Chinese and occidental? Chinese people like paying the bill for friends when they go to the restaurant but occidental like separate.      

                         YES          NO

2>  Do you think separate payment is a stingy behavior in China? Especially when a man and a woman together go to restaurant, man pay the entire bill that can show the better behavior.

                         YES          NO

3>  Do you think the eating way of Chinese people can share food with other people, but occidental is not; they just eat the food in one’s own plate.

                         YES          NO

4>  Do you think as for Chinese people, sometimes they invent friends to dinner for promoting friendship?

                         YES          NO

5>  Do you think as for Chinese, sometimes they invent people to diner for special purpose, such as a repayment way, a kind of stratagem?

                         YES          NO

6>  Do you think that adapting Chinese fairy tale can give you new good feeling?

                         YES          NO

What kind of feeling you have?

1>  Interesting because the new idea and new meaning

2>  Romantic or legendary atmospheres because their good imagination.

7>  Do you think localism can be more reflecting real existence state to ordinary people, meanwhile, localism can make you happy?

                          YES          NO

8>  What kind of localism of China you feel funny?

1>  Northern dialects like Dong Bei, Si Chuan, and He Nan

2>  Min-nan dialect

3>  Hakka dialect

9>  Do you think ‘ loser’ is an important social issue in China?

                          YES          NO

Could you tell me what kind of trouble things they have for these ‘loser’?

10>           Do you like Dream polyphony structure in this film?

YES       NO

What is your feeling?

1>  Funny

2>  Interesting

3>  Boring

11> Could you give some comments to these Chinese convention, culture, and social issue? And what is your opinion?

 

       

                       

Narrative structure -----Dream structure.

Dream  structure. 

In dreams and imagination as the main link and content, with more than two narrative lines form dialogue and conflict, from the physical space-time to psychological time-space.

Advantages: 1>To highlight the character's "psychological space", in-depth character.
                      2>it is a better way to develop plots.

In my film< flat story >, applying this structure to describe Susan's mental activity, furthermore, developing more plots in the film. making the film more interesting.  

Reference：http://group.mtime.com/angieng/discussion/737052/
                     http://baike.baidu.com/view/2209604.htm
                     http://qkzz.net/article/3ee39518-dc3f-441d-9237-56e50aedde12_2.htm

                     

Analyzing ----loser

• I wrote the script about "loser". In fact, Jack and Susan are both "loser".
• Jack is a loser, he comes from a small rural area. His family is poor. Although he get a high education by his working hard, he still a poor guy, because it not means he can get a hight pay job in the future, his family cannot able to help him and employment is very difficult in China.

•    Thus, from Jack's heart, he has a sense of inferiority. He always feel no girls can like him. He cannot get  a girlfriend.

•   So I wrote a plot about this, although Susan is not a good girl, Jack still try his best to make Susan happy, because he really need love, need a girlfriend.

• Susan also is a loser because she make effort to getting luxury life. Thus, she forced her goy friend buy everything she wants because she cannot able to afford by herself.  
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Chinese social condition----the big gap between rich and poor

• Why I talk about this and tend to make plots about this in Chinese low-budget comedy films?

           The reason is that this is an important social issue to China, in other words, it can illustrate       recently the social condition of China and the existence state of Chinese ordinary people. It  not only can close to Chinese people, but also can reflect Chinese social problem from films. 

• At present, China has become one of the world's largest disparity between the rich and the poor.
• Thus， as for low social status people in China, they are difficult to climb the social ladder.(because that their education, house register or family background.......)
• This situation not only affect their living condition and also affect their mental condition. Most of these people have a sense of inferiority.  So they like call themselves "loser". 

There are many low-budget comedy film to show "loser"'s life. Like the film< getting home>, a man take his dead body of colleague go to his hometown. The man have not money, so most time he has to carry the dead body on the way. 

<Getting Home>, 2007

Another comedy film can be seen, <Lucky Dog>, the hero is a worker, he has retired. His wife sick but he does not have money to pay the medical fee. His daughter married with an officials, but her husband is not nice to her, even he does not respect the hero, because that they are low-social status people. The hero always said he is a lucky god although he is not in his life.

                                                               <Lucky Dog>, 2009

The satiric character can be seen from events of their life, meanwhile, they show that unimportant people's funny behavior.  These points help low-budget comedy film to make funnier. 

                                           

Reference: http://www.zhihu.com/question/20246343
                   http://blog.renren.com/share/252101351/10220276682
                   http://baike.baidu.com/view/1560010.htm
                  http://www.360doc.com/content/08/0518/09/17433_1266986.shtml
   

Analyzing my film ---Locadism

In the second part of my film-Jack dates Susan. Jack speaks He Nan dialect. 

Firstly, He Nan dialect is one of the Northern dialect, so most Chinese people can understand, at least 70%people, so they can understand the funny line.

Secondly, the pronounce of He Nan is different with Mandarin. Compare with Mandarin, He Nan's dialect is more exaggerated, that is a reason why audience feel funny.

Finally, dialect can increase the personality of character, dialect combines with acting,  which can make funnier.

           

The reason of northern dialect that can make funnier than other dialects in the comedy films.

• The first reason is that most Chinese audiences can understand northern dialect, so they easily know the funny line. Furthermore, as for northern dialect, their expression and pronunciation are different with mandarin, the northern dialect can be more exaggerated， thus, the audiences will feel interesting and funner. 

• The second reason is that northern dialect usually give the Chinese people a sense， that is a little bit silly and rustic.  So people feel funny when some people speak northern dialect like Dong Bei dialect. This is because most of these areas  do not have rather developed economy. However, like Guang Dong or HongKong, these areas have advanced economy，so most Chinese people do not feel silly and rustic when they speak Cantonese. So audiences cannot feel funny.

• That is why most Chinese low-budget comedy films apply northern dialect to make funnier rather than other areas' dialect. So it is a better way applying northern dialect to make funnier for audiences in Chinese low-budget comedy film.

Reference:  http://www.zhihu.com/question/19910138 

Which areas speak northern dialect in China?

The map shows different areas speaking different dialects in China. The green color shows  70% people that speaking Northern dialect. That means at least 70% people that can understand Northern dialect.

• In the map, the green color show that  people speak northern dialect. 
• Northern dialect is the basis of Chinese dialect, although different areas have their unique pronounce, most Chinese people can understand.

Reference: http://www.chinalects.org/07/publish/funonews.asp?id=1232
                   http://www.somdom.com/general/t2732

Chinese culture----localism

1> Why apply Localism in the Chinese low-budget comedy film?

•  Localism is  a mark of regional culture.It can show the real existence state to ordinary people , meanwhile, it can achieve the effect of film realism.
• The localism can make comic effect.

   

2>What kind of Chinese dialect can make funnier for most Chinese audiences in Chinese low-budget comedy film?
        Discover

•   There are many Chinese low-budget comedy film applying localism, such as <crazy stone>, <two stupid eggs>, <happy>........ 
• in general, these films like to apply northern dialects to make funny. The typical northern dialects include Northeast Dialect，Shaanxi dialect，Sichuan dialect.......
• It is worth notice that these films apply northern dialects to make funny and get a good comment ,rather than applying other areas' dialects like (Wu dialect, Min dialect, Cantonese, Hakka dialect, Xiang dialect, Gan Dialect) ，Cantonese，Min-nan, or Hakka dialect.
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Reference:  http://www.xzbu.com/9/view-902787.htm

           http://www.zhihu.com/question/19910138
http://hi.baidu.com/yowsah/item/7ff8c24aac777dadde2a9fd0